I Went To Forbidden Planet For Comics and I’ve Regretted It Ever Since!

I had a choice made for me when I popped into Forbidden Planet yesterday to pick up my standing order.  Captain America –“Final Issue”  Fantastic Four –“Final issue” –I looked at the manager: “Seriously? Cancelled?” Then he explained the “Now Marvel” mess.

Captain America, as well as other Marvel titles, will be “Re-booted. Well, not really a re-boot” –basically, they’ll be re-numbered starting with…can you guess? Yes –they’ll all get new First issues!!  With Captain America this has already become a joke as he has actually surpassed Hawkman for the record number of first issues.  But whereas Hawkman earned this title over 40 odd years Captain America has achieved it in only a few short years!

The free Now Marvel book showed me what I would be in for. And the most pointless follow-on being Red She-Hulk.  Oh for f….

So, I am using the mess that is about to come by jumping ship. My standing order will now be miniscule!

Oh, and despite Tom Brevoort and others pooping on Stan Lee, Roy Thomas and Jim Shooter’s past achievements –as well as those of many others with the snorted “the characterisation and writing wasn’t that sophisticated back then” it was not until the 1990s that Marvel started producing piles of crap.  Marvel, under Stan, Roy and Jim MADE its name with stories that were breakthroughs and built on characterisation. Brevoort has probably had to many brown-nose sessions. I hate company “yes” men.




And you know those crap ideas of the past? Marvel is still stealing from them.

Now, Janet van Dyne, the Wasp, died (as did others) during the 2008 Secret Invasion storyline.  Okay, the others returned but don’t get me off topic here.  Hank Pym, one of the most maligned characters in Marvel Comics thanks to a string of hacks, became the Wasp (look, DO NOT LAUGH!) and, no, he did not drag up. He then became Eternity’s “Scientist Supreme” (you ARE laughing, aren’t you?).  Like Marvel’s much lauded “The Heroic Age” and all the plots from that, these titles vanished.

SPOILER ALERT –IF YOU HAVE NOT READ AVENGERS #31-32 SKIP NOW!

Well, latest Avengers issues sees a woman running about an alien looking marketplace, head bandaged so you’d guess she was injured?  She uses an out-of-date Avengers card to send a signal to her team.

Yes, the bandaged, unscarred woman is..Janet van Dyne!  Why the bandages? It’s not like she’s a famous actress or model we’d all point at and say “that’s—-!”  Anyway, she’s living in a microscopic universe. Remember the successful Micronauts comic based on the toys Marvel brought out? And their enemy Baron Karza?  Well, this micro universe is lorded over by …”Lord Gouzar”!

I think we can see where this is going?




Let me make one thing clear: the artwork is mainly very good. It is the plotlines and regurgitated/recycled stories that are ruining things.  Marvel have been losing a lot of readers and it’s no wonder.

As Newsarama reported in June:

“Marvel’s Unit and Dollar share both dropped, charting 37.82% Unit share and 33.77% Dollar share, down about a percentage point and about 2 percentage points respectively. DC’s rise by two percent to 38.23% Unit share only translated to a .3% gain in Dollar share from May to June 2012.”



Which brings me to the small number of DCs I get. I am quite happy to jump off the Justice League title, though the art is good the story is just not doing it for me (or others).  I was also confused to find that a “Justice League #0” had been slipped into my books –I’ve no idea where this has come from or WHY it is a “0” since the latest Justice League is #13?!!

Earth 2: you can say what you like but Earth 2 has always been the home of the Justice Society and to say “this isn’t” is pointless. With 52 Earths the title could have been based on any of them. As the Earth 2 versions of Earth 1s Justice League this stinks. BUT only as the JSA –the story is okay-ish and the art good. I might stick with this a while longer.


This brings me to the latest issue of Atlas Comics’ Wulf.  Wulf #6 to be exact. I’ve been very disappointed by the new Atlas and the stories and art and have written many times that the one consistently good title was Wulf. No more.
This issue looks almost rushed. At one point I was wondering whether rough pencil breakdowns of pages had been used?  Faces and figures are very “off” -it was quite…bad. And it cost more than a DC or Marvel comic.  And the story came to the lamest ending that seemed more like a “quick -we need to end this in one issue!” story.

Is this the last Wulf?  Well, do not go to Atlas’ own site because you will find nothing out there.  It’s pointless visiting.  And the message board…? Ditto. If you are going to publish at least let your readers know what is going on!  So many delays and rumours that it would be nice to know IF or even WHEN issues are to appear.

VERY VERY VERY disappointed in this last (?) issue but even more so in a company whose web site is so out of date.

I’d cry if I could be bothered.